The Existence Of God Essay -- Religion Theology Essays Papers

The Existence of God Works Cited Not Included For centuries, the idea of God has been a part of man's history. Past and present, there has always been a different integration consisting of the believers and the non-believers of God. The group of those who have "faith" in God tend to be related to one religion or another. On the other hand, the skeptics find the existence of God somewhat puzzling and try to seek the answers through scientific methods. Even as of today with all the modern technologies and the development of sciences, we still do not have a definitive answer to the question "does God exist?" Among many philosophers and scholars who have tried to answer this question, we shall look upon Rene Descartes' theory on the existence of God. In terms of believers and non-believers, Descartes would be one of the believers. Before we go any further, we must ponder upon several questions. What is God? Does God exist? If such God does exist, then where does this being come from? Why do believers and non-believers hold on to their beliefs as they do? What significance does the existence of God have upon mankind? These are only the tip of the iceberg amongst the vast array of unanswered questions related to God. Though there are so many uncertainties as we have just mentioned, the existence of all other uncertainties in our world may explain why the existence of God is so real to many people. For the believers, God provides a convenient answer to all these questions except for the answers regarding God itself. The following are some of the general arguments for the existence of God. The first argument comes from the theory of design; there are orders in the universe which can't be occurring by mere chance. Secondly, the existence of God explains the arguments regarding the efficient causality; as the world exhibits orderly causal sequences, something had to start it all up. Thirdly but not the least, God provides an answer to the question of the origin of life and its destination after death. ( For the sake of convenience, we shall borrow some theological ideas from Christianity, the Christian God, to exemplify our comparisons.) As an example, God is the creator of all, and there is a place in heaven, a kingdom of God, for those who have faith in God. This helps believers understand their identity and alleviate the fear of ... ...inite faculties of knowledge hold the potential of having mistakes. In the above discussion, I was trying neither to prove nor disprove the existence of God; I was, however, trying to offer some skepticism upon statements which many people have claimed about the existence of God. Although Descartes embraces quite a grand statement on the issues of God, I felt that his beliefs were biased towards his own perception and lacked evidence in proving that God exists to the point beyond reasonable doubt. I believe that neither Descartes nor modern science have been able to successfully prove whether God exists or not. What's really important, no matter whether such a being exists or not, is that the ideology of God has certainly existed throughout the history of man. Moreover, the power of this ideology of God has proven to be overwhelming among the believers who have faith in its religion. Even for the non-believers or so called atheists, the ideology of God has an effect and/or an influence on them in one way or another. On a larger scale, it is not an exaggeration to say that our society is built on the ideology of God. What is your opinion? "In God we trust?"